Talk:outfangthief

Not in English, no. --Connel MacKenzie 15:51, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Not in modern English anyway. Google Books has a few dozen references, mostly back to Elizabethan times and before. (Wouldn't that be Middle English??)
 * The Collected Historical Works of Sir Francis Palgrve.
 * Lectures on Scotch Legal Antiquities / Edmonston and Douglas / 1872.

Marked as archaic --Dmol 16:22, 2 November 2006 (UTC)


 * The only books.google.com references I saw indicated it was not English, archaic or otherwise. Are you seeing something different?  --Connel MacKenzie 16:40, 2 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Hello. According to this page, the Oxford Companion to British History has an entry for outfangthief (and for infangthief as well): "Examples of [legal terms] include infangthief and outfangthief (early medieval jurisdictions)". FWIW, see also page 3 of Jurisdiction as Property: Franchise Jurisdiction from Henry III to James I. — Xavier, 21:20, 2 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Admin note: I thought we spelled out somewhere that is for words 50-99 years since last used,  is for words 100 or older since being used seriously.  Is that still acceptable for everyone?  If not, shouldn't it go to WT:VOTE?  --Connel MacKenzie 05:30, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

So, shouldn't this be listed as ==Middle English== instead then? --Connel MacKenzie 12:02, 5 November 2006 (UTC)


 * A little more: My (American) local library's online OED access lists only two hits for outfangthief - neither one from a dictionary; instead, both are from "The Oxford Companion to British History" which describes the term as having become obsolete sometime in the 13th century. Sorry again, that I can't use the direct citation method they provide, without disclosing the city I am now residing in.  --Connel MacKenzie 22:30, 30 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Changed label to "Middle English". --Connel MacKenzie 06:14, 19 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Probably best known in modern times from the parody history textbook "1066 And All That" by W. C. Sellar and R. J. Yeatman, in a spoof epic (?) poem about King Canute:
 * When Cnut Cyng the Witan wold enfeoff
 * Of infangthief and outfangthief
 * Wonderlich were they enwraged
 * And wordwar waged
 * Sware Cnut great scot and lot
 * Swinge wold ich this illbegoten lot.

(enfeoff: put in possession of land in exchange for a pledge of service, in feudal society) NickS 16:15, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Requests for deletion - kept
Kept. See archived discussion of October 2008. 07:07, 6 November 2008 (UTC)